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sl4shd0rk writes "At present, several non-profit U.S. bodies oversee the Internet's specifications as well as DNS. The Unitied Nations, however, has expressed an interest in transferring control of the Internet from the United States. The UN's Dr. Toure says any change to the governance of the internet must be supported by all countries. The U.S. has refused, arguing that 'existing multi-stakeholder institutions, incorporating industry and civil society' will continue to oversee the 'health and growth of the interenet and all its benefits.' According to earlier reports, the push is backed not only by Russia, but China, Brazil and India as well."

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees, requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries, unique identification requirements, different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers" are all on the table for the UN. Sure, they would do a great job of ensuring that everyone is happy -- everyone being defined as the governments that are represented in the UN, which include several powerful governments with strong and pervasive censorship campaigns.

Also, there is no reason whatoever to hand control of the internet to the UN. Literally none. The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

The fear of a one-world government is unfounded. The UN is not set up to function as such a body, nor could it even cope with such a task if it decided to seize an opportunity. It is a patchwork of bodies, funds, institutions, and loose alliances. It is basically a loose network of international do-gooders, with a completely useless general assembly and an incredibly important security council. That's why there's so much pressure lately to expand the security council to include more countries, rotate countr

The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

The fear of a one-world government is unfounded.

Your statement about fear is unfounded. I don't think that this is what is being attempted, nor did I state such. How are you getting along with that straw man? I was trying to avoid the "one world government" trolls and instead I got a "no one world government" troll.

while this may sound a little patronizing to other nations, the UN is at it's most effective when it is aligned with the U.S.

"The fear of a one-world government is unfounded. The UN is not set up to function as such a body..."

Not only is that cart-before-the-horse, it is also false. The fact that the UN is incapable of doing it has not bearing on the fear of a one-world government. The fear is very real, and the UN has very little to do with it. Most people recognize that the UN is just a big pile of BS.

"And, while this may sound a little patronizing to other nations, the UN is at it's most effective when it is aligned with the U.S."

And maybe it WAS, but that has happened pretty rarely lately.

"It promotes what used to be first and foremost "American values" (real values, like democracy, human rights, an autonomy)"

It's SUPPOSED to do that. Doesn't mean that it actually does. The UN has lost its purpose (weak as it was to begin with) and now has its OWN agenda, which is not in lin

Seriously, the last thing the internet needs is another fucking government entity sitting on top of it, enforcing all sorts of totalitarian political favoritism (mostly towards the left) under the guise of 'freedom.' The US used to stand up to this rubbish.. I wish it still did.

1. The Human rights council is largely made up of islamic states. it's been effectively bored out from the back end and is demonstrated by the ban on criticism of sharia and other islamic tenets. the UN is has a long history of 'hat

The UN doesn't loan money... it is subsidized by the member nations. (I make that statement with full realization that you were probably being sarcastic.)

The US has "membership fees" which it has recently been reluctant to pay... and with good reason. But many people seem to forget that the UN is *IN* the United States; its building is supported with US government money; UN representatives are give care and perks courtesy of the US government (i.e., American taxpayers).

The internet is intended to be a network of networks. There's no reason why that wouldn't include a network of national networks of networks, and lots of reasons why not. Unless, of course, you've got one world government.

Actually, a sort of One World Government is precisely what makes it possible to reach the same resource when you type http://google.com/ [google.com] from anywhere in the world. A flat address space and flat naming space are only possible if everybody coordinates at some level, and the global Intern

Except that, good or bad, the US's governance of the Internet is a known quantity. It may not be perfect and may have its own inherent risks, but thus far, the US has been a reasonably good steward. Handing it off to the UN, where some major players are unabashed censors of the Internet and would have considerable motivation to undermine certain aspects of how it works, carries significant risks, and risks we may not even be aware of.

This is a situation where I say better than devil we know than the devil we don't.

The comment from the ITU guy himself shows exactly why it SHOULD be the ITU that controls the internet:

""We never vote because voting means winners and losers and you can't afford that," Dr Hamadoun Toure, the ITU's secretary-general told the BBC.

"Whatever one single country does not accept will not pass.""

This demonstrates that ITU control would actually be, without question, much better, because it would mean even things like ICE domain seizures of international domains by the US authorities wouldn't be possible. You're right that the US is a known quantity and that's ultimately the problem, we know that the US censors the global internet via domain seizures, under the ITU this simply wouldn't be possible, and the above demonstrates why. It demonstrates that the ITU requires international consensus over these sorts of things so both Chinese government censorship and US corporate censorship would equally get blocked, and the only things that would pass would be the common sense things - solutions to technical issues and challenges and such. This is exactly what whoever controls the internet should be limited to - the technical aspects of it's growth and nothing more. The US has shown it can't keep to doing just this, whilst the ITU has shown with it's many years of the international telecommunications networks that it can.

Yes, yes, I know I'll get modded down by angry patriotic Americans who feel slighted that anyone dare suggest they shouldn't control something international, and yes, I know I'll get all the arguments about how some random commission at the fringe of the UN has Iran in it which obviously means the whole of the UN is broken, and yes I know I'll even get the new world order kooks telling me how the UN is actually out to take over the world run by a super-secret organisation of elf-magicians who eat pixies for lunch or whatever the conspiracy theorists have cooked up now.

But ultimately it doesn't matter, because the ITU is still the only organisation in the world that has shown it is capable of handling this sort of thing in an objective manner.

Organisations like the ITU really just aren't political, they're technical organisations staffed by some of the most succesful academics in their relevant fields. A lot of people don't get that, they see UN security council failure to act on Syria and assume the whole UN is bad, but that's really just like saying because you met a grouchy Red Cross guy once, they shouldn't be responsible for delivering any kind of aid, ever. Really, the comments thus far in this thread are nothing but 100% fear mongering, they have absolutely no basis in fact, they demonstrate actually no understanding of how the likes of the ITU are governed and act, and who by. They're simple kneejerk reactions to a perceived slight against American internet mismanagement.

Despite this, as is always the case with discussions regarding the UN on Slashdot, bring on the ignorant uninformed nutjobs in 3...2...1...

I simply don't believe it. I'm not saying the US is a completely reliable steward, but it's known quantity. You live in a fantasy land if you think wresting the Internet from the US is going to make nonsense impossible.

Until we have full-blown mesh networks and other ways of networking equipment together and central control of any kind becomes irrelevant, I'm sticking with the current management.

"Everyone knows the US will be a puppet to US corporate shenanigans as the seek to capitalise and profit off of control of the internet."

So... a NON-PROFIT corporation, which is advised by A PANEL CONSISTING OF GOVERNMENTS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD, is a US-corporate shill? You're dreaming.

Now, it is true, ICANN has made a number of recent blunders. Not only its TLD auction, which some saw as blatant money-grubbing (although, again, it is a non-profit), to its method of deciding name disputes, which it assigned to a "target-shoot", requiring the disputants to send an http request at precisely a specific time... the closer to the target time

All the arguments against the UN could equially be made of the US. Additionally it's not at all clear to me why I have to pay an American company to maintain my.com registration. Certainly there's no indication it was chosen as being the best value for money.

The.com registry (VeriSign) charges $7.85/year for registration at the wholesale level (plus an $0.18 ICANN fee), regardless of if you're Joe Schmoe Blogger or Google. That seems like a pretty reasonable expense for maintaining a registry of 100+ million domain names with 100% uptime since it was founded.

Would it be nice if it cost a bit less? Sure. I'm still not that worried about it -- the fee is less than I paid for lunch yesterday and the savings of a dollar or two in terms of an annual registration are basically not even worth discussing in terms of practical savings.

VeriSign certainly seems to know how to handle the registry side of things pretty well, and I don't really see any technical or financial reasons why I should be concerned./I never thought I'd be in a position to defend VeriSign, but in this case they seem to be doing a darn good job.

Yes.The UN is not democratic or even representative of the People it is bossing around. I don't have a gentleman representing me & making my voice heard in the world government. None of us do. The UN running the internet is an illegitimate use of power. (Similarly: This is why I refuse to pay any income or sales tax to a state or country where I do not live/have not set foot inside. No taxation without representation.)

Every country in the world has a representative to the UN general assembly. That's actually better than if you're in Syria, China, or a plethora of other places where you have no representation, and are obliged to pay taxes.

Technically by the way, that narrowly foolish talking point that 'no taxation without representation' doesn't even apply to the US, where if you live in D.C. for example you are subject to federal taxes but can't vote for federal representatives. Nor does it include people who are inte

So the Chinese and Syrian people have a representative in the UN. That's great, but how does it represent those people in any way? They are not choosing who represents them, the government they have no say in is choosing these people. I believe that was the GP's point.

What is proposed is not removing control for the US government and handing it to the US, but removing control from non profit organizations that happen to exist in the US and handing it to the UN. Given the UNs structure, the US government would have more control over the internet if the internet were under the control of the UN.

The US government does not have the only say on the direction of the net as is. By contrast, the UN would have the only say on the direction of the net if control was transferred

UN control of the Internet would kill the Internet as we know it. Long distance fees, requirements that you respect censorship laws in other countries, unique identification requirements, different regulatory classes for "service providers" and "consumers" are all on the table for the UN. Sure, they would do a great job of ensuring that everyone is happy -- everyone being defined as the governments that are represented in the UN, which include several powerful governments with strong and pervasive censorship campaigns.

ENDQUOTE

The idea that some single country controls a global resource is not acceptable to countries that are not congruent with USA political policy. Suppose the Internet was controlled by a non -USA country, that does not agree with USA policies? How would the US feel? How would the the USA control its utilities, since many use the web for managing their infrastructure. The USA has already wrongly turned off the switch on at least one service company, putting the company at a major financial disad

It is my honest belief that one of the things that is worse than the current US control of the internet would be UN control.In fact it may be the worst decision that could be made. I think that the internet would be better off being controlled by China than by the UN.North Korea and a few of the Arab states would be the only things I can think of that might be worse than the UN.

See, I disagree on this; my view is that control should be decentralized. The fact that giving the UN control would worsen the situation does not mean that ICANN should remain in charge. We need to lower the barriers to entry when it comes to peering, develop a better system for domain names, and get IPv6 deployed -- then we can say that anyone with networking equipment and a minimum level of technical knowledge can participate in running and governing the Internet.

The UN charter states explicitly that "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers" From 1948, in it's non legally binding charter, and essentially the same thing in its legally binding agreements that only about 150 countries have signed on to.

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

Having any one country "in charge" greatly increases the temptation to further "balkanize" the DNS system, where ".com" means something in "most of the world" but something else in countries that force their ISPs to use an in-country, government-controlled DNS provider. By having an international body handle things like this, countries that don't get their way but who at least respect the process will be less likely to run their own DNS.

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

No one country is in charge of DNS; some important domain names fall under the jurisdiction of the US government, but country-specific TLDs belong to specific countries. IP allocations are a different story, but ICANN is not controlled by the US government, it is just under the US government's jurisdiction.

I know full well that there are countries that do not like the job ICANN is doing. Countries that have national firewalls -- not the weak attempt by ICE (DNS hijacking), but real firewalls that actually inspect packets and kill connections -- want to change the rules to make censorship easier. China would prefer if other countries would just require servers to refuse to give "objectionable" information to Chinese citizens. The reason those sorts of countries are turning to the UN is that unlike the US, the UN actually respects those censorship campaigns (after all, national sovereignty must be respected, even if it violates the UN's definition of human rights) and will try to force everyone else to respect those campaigns.

unlike the US, the UN actually respects those censorship campaigns (after all, national sovereignty must be respected, even if it violates the UN's definition of human rights) and will try to force everyone else to respect those campaigns

I've heard other people assert this same thing. I was wondering if there's any evidence of the UN actually doing something like this.

Well, take a look at some of the ITU-T Y series recommendations if you want to know where these ideas come from. A lot of it is technical e.g. protocols and ways to interoperate, but some of it is related to policy -- like requirements for non-repudiation in "next generation networks."

In general, the UN respects national sovereignty i.e. the UN will not authorize intervention in a country's laws or government unless the violations of human rights are extreme (and even then, they show their bias -- like sending peacekeepers to central Africa and ordering them to not discharge any firearms). This is mainly because countries like China and Russia would never have bothered with the UN if they would have been required to change their laws. The UN was originally created to prevent another world war, not to spread freedom or democracy.

Unfortunately, this means that the UN is not going to do anything that threatens the Great Firewall or similar national firewalls if they gain control of ICANN or otherwise have a say in Internet policy and governance. More likely, the UN would listen to the complaints of China -- those horrible Americans with their NY Times and Google -- and work to create a system that forces countries to respect each other's Internet laws (including censorship). That is how we keep the peace.

If I were any other country, I would probably ask myself that too. Then, I would look at one of the most corruptible global organizations and reconsider, unless I was one of the countries hoping to corrupt the process to begin with: e.g., Russia, China, India, or any of the Middle Eastern nations.

America is where most of the hardware is, its where the project originated, its based of work from DARPA, etc. If anyone should be "in charge" it should be us. Not that there's anything stopping other countries from managing their own segments.

Bla Bla Bla Greater good.... Each country it looking out for itself. Besides Moral reasons, they only reason why the US doesn't just Nuke the rest of the world, is because they offer things that could benefit us more then the benefit of nuking the rest of the world. When ever you have a county give up their hard fought/well deserved assets. They will not like it and reject and fight against it.

If I were other countries, I'd ask myself why any one country should be "in charge" of things like DNS.

If I were a computer scientist, I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist doesn't know that the DNS system is a hierarchical database.

Next, I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist doesn't understand that "hierarchical databases" are by their nature "hierarchical".

Then I'd ask myself what kind of computer scientist, who doesn't know the top level DNS server is actually named ".", not ".com", and has records for other servers named ".com", ".org", ".us", ".uk", and so on, is qualified to discuss n

There's a lot of interest in controlling the medium of communications that is bridging us into the future. Don't accept the lesser of two evils, promote a better solution. We're always on H.R. away from turning the internet into a carnival fairway.

Here is something that would go a long way: reduce the barriers to entry for peering with ISPs. The requirements many ISPs have for peering make it impossible for a small, community-run network to become part of the Internet; such networks generally wind up paying for service from a telecom monopoly.

A global network can be governed by its users (or at least those who have the equipment and expertise needed to participate); Fidonet comes to mind here.

At first impulse I had the same feeling. UN? Eh, why not. Internet's an international thing nowadays... Then I was reminded that Russia and China were there. Ha! Fuck no. Sorry.

For all of the fucked up, twisted things we do in the US we're doing an OK job on this one. I don't care how many "issues" we have. We don't need the keys handed to a corrupt human rights abusing dictatorship, and an ex secret police murdering madman with delusions of grandeur.

The purpose of posting anonymously is to say things coherently that might not otherwise be said if you put a name on it. You wrote something incoherent that should have been left in the bin of broken troll posts.

the way the US has done things, they're the lesser of evils compared to the UN. Especially when you toss Russia, and China, and other dictatorships, neo-dictatorships into the mix. The best solution in the end will end up being decentralizing the entire thing and keeping it away from any national body.

Don't underestimate India's capacity for Internet censorship even though it's not run by a dictator. You need countries that fight against censorship, and don't care about "protecting people's sentiments". Only those countries deserve the stewardship of what is arguably on the greatest inventions of mankind.

Don't underestimate India's capacity for Internet censorship even though it's not run by a dictator.

India fits firmly in the pot of a neo-dictatorship. I thought that would have been self-evident, they have a very keen interest in censorship because they have neighbors nearby with a much higher standard of living, while they have rampant corruption, and a much lower standard of living. Those are the conditions for mass riots. Unless they try and control the flow of information, India will collapse with the free flow of information. That's inevitable.

Nonsense. Just ensure that people are swiftly punished for violence and see how quickly all riots stop. Right now riots are politically motivated and the perpetrators are not afraid of the law. Change that one little aspect and everything falls into place. Regular people don't care about rioting. If there's a mob you can be sure it's political.

Just wait until India gets the right to take action against websites anywhere that post the actual border with Pakistan. Hoo boy, that's gonna be a sh*tstorm, and no mistake (and for that matter, Pakistan as well. In *either* country, if any representation is made that all of Kashmir doesn't belong to *them*, the government screams like a banshee).

Let's just give each nation their own block of addreses (which will be easier when ipv6 is universal) and let them assign them as they wish. Let them all have their own name servers to control their block of addresses and they will have to cache other name servers for other countries to be able to address content not their own. They can also erect whatever firewall they want where their country meets the world (wireless networks via satelite might be a problem, T.S.). However, no filtering will be done o

In general, the US can be browbeaten into keeping things neutral. SOPA/PIPA got shot down when China notified the US that blocking access to one of their sites would be similar to a naval blockade -- an act of war.

However, with the UN, this wouldn't happen. They can block sites at will, with zero recourse. Say someone in the US makes jokes about the Thai rulers. Their website can be dropped off the net. Similar if there is a site pointing out brutality in China or India. Poof, it is history, and there is no way to deal with it. The UN is subject to no law or no checks and balances.

Say someone in the US makes jokes about the Thai rulers. Their website can be dropped off the net

You seem to think that ITU would continue the policy of "anything with an IP address can be a service provider (e.g. a web server)" -- I think ITU would divide Internet hosts into three or more classes: government, commercial service provider, and consumer. Government systems would have special privileges / no restrictions, but would have to serve a function of government (perhaps this could include propaganda). Commercial service providers would be things like Facebook, Youtube, etc. -- potentially ru

So you think we should not be allowed to run our own web or IRC servers? Are you serious? Right now, I can grab a $10/mo VPS and set up my own mail and web server. That's part of what makes this network so flexible.

No, I think that any system with an IP address should be able to act as a server for whatever protocol the operator wants. My point was that the ITU would almost certainly change that, so that different systems have different service classes.

Having a VPS will not really help; if you are providing a service, you will need to follow the rules for your service class. Do you think your rented VPS will somehow escape rules that require you to refuse service to people whose governments' object to that communi

No one, the USA nor the UN should "control" the internet. Anyone should be free to set up DNS servers and anyone else free to use any they want.

Anyone having "control" only means that control will be used for evil purposes in time. It's inevitable. The internet is too important for that. Technical standards should be set by an apolitical body of engineers. There should be no other influence of governments or political bodies. No nation's laws should apply outside their borders.

So far the USA has caused some problems, but the UN will cause worse ones as it will grant more control to authoritarian governments which want religious based censorship.

Anyone should be free to set up DNS servers and anyone else free to use any they want.

The issue is with DNS itself. We need a fully distributed, and censorship-resilient name system, and not something that can be attacked at or near the root(s).

But all this DNS-talk is moot anyway: the REAL potential for censorship takes place at 1/ the Tier-1 backbones (withdrawing BGP route announcements), 2/ at international gateways (with selective access lists, e.g. the Chinese Firewall) and 3/ within corporate-own

The US has "control" only in so far as everyone uses infrastructure (at least with regards to DNS) that is ultimately accountable to US companies. This is just de facto control, not de jure control. Anyone is free to set up their own alternate root system, from an individual up to a bloc of nations. Indeed there are other ones out there, just small ones. Larger ones can be set up. Nothing is stopping the EU from running their own root authority.

I can handle that kind of US control because it means that if push comes to shove, other people can do their own thing. The US has control only because others don't choose to exert the control they can have, it is a real anarchy. I do not want a system where the UN has statutory control, where people can't do their own thing because it is illegal per international treaty.

If control is what they want, they should invent, and pay for the development of their own internet equivalent themselves. Right now, all they own is their own servers and communications infrastructure.

Do NOT handle ANY control to the brazilian government .The first thing they will do is take down everything that will speak against their major corrupt politicianS (with big Plural) .And the Brazilian LAW FORBIDS anonymity.

Brazil govt: PLEASE GO AWAY

There is several reasons why we buy: iphone (designed in US), use Facebook (made in US) and use Google (made in us).

And one of the reasons is that the US law and business way is more 'clear'.(if you think I am wrong..do business in Brazil and you are going to see the red-tape/bribe Hell)

Russia and China?? Serious?? the same homies that are supporting the crazy lunatics?

You, my friend, forgot one of the nastier laws in this God forsaken land: YOU CAN BE ARRESTED FOR TELLING THE TRUE.

If I publicly state a fact, but someone gets offended by that fact, he can sue me for damages. Every corrupt politician uses this law when convenient. Defamation, in Brazil, is a felony against the "honor" - and we consider defamation *anything* that detriments the public image of someone, no mater being true or not.

What a troll! Interesting? I hope not.Being myself a brazilian I say this troll's views on brazilian government are somewhat wrong. I don't deny the existence of corruption in Brazil, but it's not as bad as in the other part of the world (Brazil is ranked #73 in the 192 countries participating in Corruption Perceptions Index).

In reality, there are some very successful brazilian business. The "bribe hell" he talks about is probably the fate of businesses that would not want to pay due taxes (counts as corrup

Because the MAFIAA/IFPI-bought politicians in Europe are happy with the way the US censors^Wcontrols DNS already. In their minds: no further action needed. Copyright-based censorship is already in place, and they can blame the 800lb gorilla USA for enforcing it with domain seizures, so they don't have to take the heat for doing it themselves. It's the OTHER censorship, the political one, that the U.N. is trying to implement, in addition to the Copyright-based one.

An internet where US lobbiers of patents, media and others pushes their own agendas over the government that controls internet, and had so many abuses over that so far? Maybe won't be so different if the UN is in charge, but is in pretty bad shape now.

US -- ICE hijacks DNS entries and can be circumvented with a browser extension.

Countries pushing for UN control -- national firewalls, a constant cat-and-mouse game to circumvent those firewalls, requirements that ISPs participate in censorship, censorship of political opinions, censorship of news (facts), criminalization of the act of circumvention in addition to distributing circumvention tools, etc.

Now, I am not one to defend ICE or any of the US government's Internet censorship, but let's be clear:

Really, when ICE hijacks a DNS entry, they are not stepping outside of US borders; you can register your DNS name as a.co.uk or whatever for your country, and the US will not legally touch you (or your government will cooperate, but at least that is your government and not some hack).

What we really need is a decentralized system of Internet governance, but transferri

The one thing the US does much better is protecting free speech. We can post pornography, hate speech (who defines that, by the way?), how to make bombs, things that our society and often our government both view as repugnant, but somehow, it's still legal. Not that we don't have occasional attacks on that, but our free speech tends to hold up in the end.

There are few places that would be as good as the United States to to host a network of free discourse. It may well be because of that that the most successful such network is based there.

The UN is a constituency of pro-censorship entities. The only reason they want to control the internet is so that they can control the internet.

The US government could fuck up a wet dream to the point one would long for the sensation of having one's genitals removed with belt sander.And the UN is no different. Just multinational.While both were founded with the right idea, they've both gone GREIVIOUSLY astray, to the point that they're generally more harmful than helpful.

HOWEVER, the US government DOES, occasionally do things "correctly".I really, REALLY wish I could say the same thing about the UN.

At this point, the US stewardship of the Internet isn't the most desirable outcome. But it's a damn sight better than handing it over to an (at best) wildly ineffectual and horrifically subverted organization like the UN.

Handing over control of free speech and open access to information to people who have every intention of demolishing both? Are you fucking nuts?

I hate the bloated panopticon monster my government has become, and I seriously think that it needs to be pared back, by armed conflict if necessary. But I'd have the politicians here where we can get at them and remove them, than some asshat in a bunker in China where we'd have to start a war to remove them.

I am always surprised at now negative Americans (specifically those from the United Stated) are about the UN. Remember the UN has been in charge of international telephony standards for years (the ITU is a UN agency), and on the whole international telephony has worked OK.

If you aren't American, and even if you are a friend of America, American control over key parts of the Internet is a concern. An important utility is controlled by a foreign power. How would US citizens feel if their water or electricity supply was under the control of the British government? We are a democracy and have been good friends of the US for a long time, but I bet US cititizens would be agitating for those utilities to be under US control.

Your comment is based on a false premise: that the US government controls the internet. The US government does not control the internet. Control of the internet, such as it is, comes from organizations that are located within the borders of the United States but are not government departments or under the direct control of the US government except inasmuch as they are subject to US law. That, in my opinion, is a vastly superior situation to that which would obtain if the UN controlled the internet. And

yes.... which is happening already. Try to watch netflix outside the US, the BBC olympic coverage outside the UK, buying certain products from overseas, and so on. Sure, yeah, proxies, but if those are ever used by more than a trivial % of users, they'll be shut down. For normal users, the internet is already balkanized.

All of those "balkanizations" are performed by the provider themselves. There is no separation between two parties that want to communicate, except for places like China and Iran. In other words, nothing is stopping Netflix from providing their services to everyone in the world aside from Netflix themselves (and of course their agreements with other people). The Internet itself is not fragmented: certain websites are, but that is their problem and their doing.

You don't get it. The next presidential term will start in 2013, which is 21 years after 1992. This is obviously meant to commemorate the fact that the National Minimum Drinking Age act was passed two years after Obama turned 21, after it safely wouldn't affect him.

Don't you see? This is the Illuminati once again ensuring that its elite members can go out and party while us common folk get screwed, and then they have the balls to remind us all of how we're just complacent sheep!

Don't you see? Conspiracy theories make perfect sense if sanity isn't an issue for you!

Don't you see? This is the Illuminati once again ensuring that its elite members can go out and party while us common folk get screwed, and then they have the balls to remind us all of how we're just complacent sheep!

So, we are being screwed and we are sheep... So the Illuminati are screwing sheep? You would think with all that money and power they could do better... Or is there something about sheep that's being kept from the common people? OMG, I see it now! It does all make sense!I am upgrading from tinfoil to Stainless Steel foil at once! [amazon.com]

Meh. Agenda 21 is by far less a conspiracy theory than some things people think, plenty of cities(including my own) have already included some of their platform into their urban planning, so does it exist? Yep, is it real? Yep. Is it evil and insidious? Well I suppose that depends on how tight your tinfoil cap is. Is it "one world government" material? Meh..that's crackpot stuff. Personally, I'm leery of any supernational body where someone isn't elected giving "strong suggestions" on how to do something to a local government. It's kinda like the EU, don't like it.

Personally, I'd figure more Americans would be worried about their own DOJ and Holder, blackballing the committee hearings on illegal gunrunning to Mexico and killing 300 people, while letting the guns walk. That entire thing is a pretext for "see, look at all those guns--they're in the hands of criminals and they're getting back into the US and all the rest." That's not conspiracy work, that's already happened. The guns flowed both ways. And before, someone get's their panties in a twist and go "Bush did it too" indeed, though their guns were tracked. Holder, just let their guns go free, no tracking, notta. The DoJ has already backwalked on that one.

Oh no the guns were tracked with Bush but thanks for playing....and where the heck are all the supposed gun control laws that are supposed to come out of this conspiracy theory that the obama administration let the guns walk so they could enact gun control laws....nice one zippy.

Four years ago, the story was that Obama was going to enact all the gun laws to take everyone's guns away.

Now the story is that he needed to get re-elected so he had to bide his time. Now, in his second term, he'll REALLY take everyone's guns away.

and where the heck are all the supposed gun control laws that are supposed to come out of this conspiracy theory that the obama administration let the guns walk so they could enact gun control laws....nice one zippy.

That's part of the question, especially since the contempt charge was blocked by the democrats. Which means that other avenues are now needed to find out exactly what was going on and where, and exactly what watergatish type BS was going on. And exactly how far the rot goes. Either Holder did this all on his own, or Obama signed off on it as well. In which case there's a lot of stink. There's no conspiracy theory here, only facts, and pretexts. You might have missed the news back about 3 weeks or 4 weeks ago, back before the Aurora shooting of the Dem's wanting to push back in the Assault weapons ban, and several other things all at once "just in time" for the election.

Funny how a lone Canadian occasionally paying attention to your news catches this and you don't.